


Sara, Enchanted

by ratherunnecessary



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Costume Parties & Masquerades, Crossdressing, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-01
Updated: 2017-08-01
Packaged: 2018-12-03 04:32:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11524620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ratherunnecessary/pseuds/ratherunnecessary
Summary: As heir to the Twin Throne of Bizidel, Princess Sara has had her life set out for her from birth: marry well, make as little trouble as possible, and (eventually) rule the country alongside her brother. And she's prepared to do so—until a mysterious masked stranger makes her consider whether the future she's been prepared for is the future she actually wants.[anella enchantedau]





	Sara, Enchanted

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TereziMakara](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TereziMakara/gifts).



> Set in the world of Gail Carson Levine's _[Ella Enchanted](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ella_Enchanted)_ , with heavy influences from the writing of [Sherwood Smith](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherwood_Smith). Special thanks to LANY for releasing their [self-titled album](https://open.spotify.com/album/0HiwsXForePsWdIZW6EEkK) just in time for me to have it on repeat while writing, and to the Ever After soundtrack for helping set the mood. And, of course, to TereziMakara for having some fantastic prompts that got me thinking immediately.

* * *

SARA, ENCHANTED

* * *

 

It’s one hour before the first guests are due to arrive and Mickey is screaming in the hallway about the embroidery on his doublet.

Even down the hall, in her rooms, two sets of doors between them, with three maids stepping around each other to finish her hair, Sara can hear him clear as day. “Emil,” he’s shouting, “fetch that wretched seamstress immediately so I can tell her _directly_ that this shoddy work is utterly _unacceptable_ and will not be _tolerated_ —”

“Close the door, Claudia, please,” Sara says, and the room fills with blissful quiet. It’s the calm before a storm—a crumbling dam before a hundred-year-flood, really—but then Rosa’s hand slips and a pin digs into Sara’s scalp. She closes her eyes.

“My lady,” Claudia says hurriedly, “do you have a headache coming on? I’m so sorry. I’ll ring for some tea immediately. Rosa, you’re not needed here any longer.”

“Claudia, it’s fine, I don’t need—” Sara starts to protest, but Claudia is already shooing Rosa and the new girl (shamefully, Sara’s already forgotten her name) out of the room and exchanging words with the page waiting beside the door. Sara closes her eyes again and Claudia’s fingers are much more gentle when they take up the remaining braiding.

“You look ravishing.” Claudia gently turns her chin towards the mirror. “Look, my lady.”

The girl in the reflection is more grown up than Sara has ever felt. Her braided hair is artfully piled on top of her head. The shimmer across her lids brings hazel flecks out of amethyst eyes. Her shoulders, bare above the graceful neckline, are bronze in the fading sunlight. The green taffeta falls in soft waves about her.

“Are you pleased, my lady?”

“Yes,” Sara lies. Claudia clasps her hands together.

“I can’t believe this day has finally come. You and the prince, of age!” Here voice is soft as she dabs scent under Sara’s ears.

“Me either,” Sara says. She avoids her own gaze in the mirror; her eyes land on the outer door just as it creaks open. Her mother slips through, the page on her heels.

“The Queen of Bizidel,” he says hurriedly. Mama flicks a hand at him.

“I don’t require an announcement when I’m entering my own daughter’s room,” she says. There is no vexation in her tone—only firmness—but the page’s faze freezes with horror all the same and he withdraws quickly. She sighs. “Even the youngest pages are already terrified of your old mother.”

Sara doesn’t say anything. The queen wears a magnificent lace and silk dress that is, just as Sara’s, done in the Crispino forest green. Her crown is already on her head.

“She looks beautiful. Well done, Claudia.” The dismissal is clear; Claudia curtsies and leaves. “Here.”

A box appears in her hands, pulled from the folds of her skirt. She hands it to Sara. A slim coronet winks at her when she opens it: gold filigree woven cunningly around a single, oval ruby.

The queen lifts it from the velvet cushion and nestles it into Sara’s hair. The extra weight goes straight through her skull to her temples. “Now you’re ready,” her mother murmurs. She drops her hands to Sara’s shoulders. “You look like a queen, dearest.”

 _I look like you_. Again, she says nothing. Her mother squeezes her shoulders, once.

“You’ve been waiting for this for a long time, I know,” Mama continues, still in that quiet murmur. “You deserve to enjoy yourself. But don’t forget who you are, and what your future holds.”

Sara bows her head. “I won’t.”

—-

Sara is sipping her mint tea with extra lemon in the southern chamber when Mickey finally comes down. Unsurprisingly, his doublet looks perfect. The twining Crispino roses languish on a bed of crimson clover over his heart, with the clover motif all the around the edges. His coronet is much the same as Sara’s, though with a square ruby instead.

“I’m sending that girl straight back to Siano tomorrow morning,” he announces loudly, even though Sara and Claudia, at Sara’s side, are the only two people in the cavernous room. He sweeps over to the sideboard and pours himself a glass of wine.

“You won’t,” Sara says. “It would take just one snag from some lady’s overly-jeweled sleeve to shred it, and you would have to send Emil galloping after her so you could have it repaired in time for the second ball.”

Mickey ignores her in favor of cracking the inner door so he can peek into the hall. “The crest has a wrinkle straight down the middle.”

“Close that. No, it doesn’t.”

“The one on the banner,” Mickey says, but he closes the door. He paces back across the room and pivots, one foot out in front in the starting position for the _bassadanza_. “Want to practice one more time?”

“No,” Sara says. The ache in her temples has lessened only slightly. She sets her cup aside and Claudia, without saying anything, goes to the rear door to have a word with the page. Minutes later, another tray of tea arrives and this one, from the scent, is something stronger than mint. Brandy, probably, but Sara just downs the cup without asking. By the time Emil enters, the pain is gone entirely.

“The guests are starting to arrive, milord,” he says before looking over at Sara. He puts his hand to his heart in mock surprise. “Princess Sara?! My god, I barely recognize you. Is this the same girl who ground my face into the mud on my second day in the keep?”

Sara’s laughing by the end of the speech. “You could simply say I look nice.” He winks.

“Where’s the fun in that?”

“Stop clowning around, Emil,” Mickey barks. It usually takes one of Emil’s more outrageous remarks to get Mickey to snap so quickly. Sara pleats the heavy velvet of her skirt between her fingers. _He's nervous._ Somehow, Mickey’s anxiety tames the panic running through her veins.

“Let’s practice one more time, Mickey,” she says, and rises. His posture immediately goes ramrod straight and he puts both arms behind his back as he comes toward her. He bows and extends an arm, which Sara takes after curtsying. They’ve rehearsed it so many times that she could do it in her sleep: the voice of Alida, their dance instructor, rings through her head immediately. _Light feet! You are gliding through the air, like a butterfly, like a bird. Posture, posture. Don’t look down! Instructions are not on the floor! Stop glaring, Michele._

Mickey is indeed glaring. Sara presses her palm into the top of his hand and he looks over, surprised. “Am I doing it?”

“Ferociously,” Sara says. “You’ll scare off every eligible lady within the country’s borders.”

“If I’m frowning during the ball, you have to give me some sort of sign. Mama will have my hide if the gossip tomorrow is about my sour face.”

“I’ll do this.” Sara touches her edge of her mouth with her fingertip, so lightly it could be an absent-minded gesture. “It’s good we’re not wearing masks. If all I could see was your mouth, you’d look like some sort of terror.”

“I am,” Mickey says, only half-joking. He adjusts his gloves. “Emil?”

“Not much longer, milord.”

Mickey sighs and Sara can’t help but sigh a little as well. She’s been waiting for this night for just about her entire life. The least the universe could do would be to move time a bit faster.

—-

The opening of the ball goes off without a hitch, though Sara has to fight an odd sense of vertigo the whole time. The masks are very, very unreal. Sara wonders, after they’ve been introduced with full titles and the queen officially opens the ball, if she’s dreaming. Faces Sara has known her whole life are blanked out by luxurious gold and silver and pearled masks. They have the Kyrrian court to thank for starting the trend; ten years ago, they simply would have thrown a Name Day party. “We’re more civilized now,” her mother likes to say.

Mickey escorts her to the dance floor for the first _bassadanza_ , and then selects the Okukawa heir as instructed. Sara notes her by the indigo threading on her gown—a clever way to identify herself under the mask. A man offers his arm to Sara, and she takes it before her mind catches up and realizes he must be the young Duke all the way from Giacomo, at the mountainous Ayorthian border. It had been a delicate matter, selecting the first partners for each of them, and even more so in orchestrating it. The headache threatens a return at the recollection of the machinations.

When they pivot, Sara has a glimpse of the dais where her mother sits. Slightly back and to the right sits her consort Antonio. Two bare faces in a sea of nothing. The queen surveys the dance floor with her assessing eyes, absorbing every detail. She catches Sara’s gaze and turns one hand upward just slightly. _Posture_. Sara straightens immediately.

“...And may I say, your highness,” Giacometti is saying in a low voice, “you look absolutely ravishing tonight. Has it only been a year since I last saw you?” His mask is a heavy-looking monstrosity encrusted with the his county’s native lapis.

“Three,” Sara says. “I am very sorry to hear of your uncle’s passing. A loss for the country.”

“For the country, maybe, but not for me!” The dance finishes and he bows to her. He winks just before he leaves.

His wink is not at all like Emil’s. Sara can tell he means it, but another suitor offers his arm for the next dance and she has to put the thought aside.

—-

The next hour is a blur of bland titled face after another. When the fifth dance ends and they’re allowed, the women unmask far more quickly than the men. Sara is complimented on her hair, her dress, her makeup (by one daring lordling), her dancing, her small feet, her resemblance to her mother, the size of the hall, the state of the roads, and once on Bizidel’s latest tax increase.

This last is by Viktor Nikiforov, so it hardly counts. The notorious playboy and court decoration grins when Sara tries to stutter out an appropriate response, but there simply isn’t one.

“Don’t worry, my lady,” he says, in his languid drawl. “I’m not expecting a reply on that one.” He kisses her hand as the harpsichord sounds the final note of the gavotte.

“Then why?” Sara says, half-under her breath. Nikiforov’s icy eyes can’t help but look like they’re teasing her.

“To remind you what it feels like to be something other than the perfect queen-in-waiting. Did it work?”

Sara pulls her hand out of his. His laughter follows her all the way to the gardens.

—-

She’s halfway through her normal route before the ringing in her ears fades. She should feel embarrassed at being baited so easily, so early on in the the first night, but she can’t muster the energy. She’s grateful for the excuse to be outside. She had tried to convince Mama to hold the dance in the gardens, but Dell’Ovo’s summer weather was deemed too fickle.

Beyond the flower beds just below the balcony, the gardens are empty; the servants haven’t even lit the torches, but the eyelash moon reflected in the Zaciras is enough light for Sara. The tide washes quietly against the sea wall. The huge olive tree planted at the center of the grove looms up out of the dark quickly. As always, the enormity of it calms Sara in an instant.

That is, until she sees someone at its base. Digging.

Sara steps forward without thinking. “You there! What do you think you’re doing?”

It’s only after the person startles up that Sara realizes they could be anyone—an assassin, a _condottiere_ , who slipped in during the revelry to... what? Steal an entire tree? _Your imagination is, as always, much faster than your common sense_ , Mickey would have said.

They—he is very small, anyway, the supposed vagrant, and wearing a mask dyed a dusky rose that Sara can see as he steps into the cast of lamplight. He brushes the earth off his hands furtively. “I’m—nothing. I dropped my. Mask.”

“It’s on your face,” Sara points out. His high voice sounds young. Very young. Too young to be attending a ball, certainly. Unless he’s one of those Ayorthaian countertenors. Sara has only heard of the famed Ayorthaian singers; Mickey had returned from their court with endless tales.

The man touches a hand to his mask. “It is, isn’t it. You see, while I was looking for it, I also dropped my pin.” It winks in the light as he flourishes it. “Which I just found.” He fastens it to his plain doublet and pulls his shoulders back with a self-assuredness that makes him seem several inches taller. “Don’t worry, I’m not stealing anything.”

“I never said you were,” Sara says haughtily. She turns to go, but the man steps towards her.

“Do you mind if I—that is, can I walk you back to the castle?”

Sara almost says yes without thinking, since that’s what would be appropriate. Then she draws herself up to her full height (which is still nothing remarkable) and says, “I don’t require an escort in my own gardens. Thank you.”

She sweeps away grandly. The effect is ruined when she steps on the hem of her dress, trips, and goes sprawling.

The man is kneeling at her side moments later. Sara pushes herself up from the gravel, irritated, and pulls her skirts from around her ankles. There’s a huge rip in the lace trim. Oh, Claudia will have her _head_ for ruining it. Curse it!

“Did you hurt yourself? Here—” The man puts small hands around Sara’s waist and heaves her to her feet. “Did you hurt your ankle?”

Sara steps away, putting a bit of space between the two of them. “No, I’m fine.” There’s gravel in her bodice but she refrains from digging it out. “Thank you.” Her face is very hot in the darkness.

The man trails behind her as she walks stiffly back towards the castle. “I didn’t know you were a Crispino. My apologies for my presumption. Of course you don’t need an escort.”

“Not only am I a Crispino, but I am Sara Crispino. Marchesa of the Northern Reaches, future Queen of Bizidel, heir to the Twin Throne and the land on which you are standing.” The titles are at the top of her mind from hearing them read out loud earlier that evening. “You?”

“Well, I’m Yuri, duke of nothing and heir to no one. An entirely unimportant person.” He grins, widely. His teeth are very even.

“A pleasure,” Sara says, dipping a curtsy on instinct. “I’ve never been introduced to no one before.”

“You handled it very well. Nobody has ever curtsied to me before.”

“Really? Some days I feel as if I’ve curtsied to the whole world.”

“The miserable half. Only miserable people can curtsy with such awful indifference.”

“I didn’t look indifferent!” The man—Yuri almost collides with her when she stops.

“How else can you look when you do something without thinking?”

Sara turns to face him square on. She sweeps a low, protracted, and utterly sincere curtsy. “The pleasure is mine,” she intones. Yuri applauds.

“Very impressive. I take it back. You meant every word, which is even more frightening.”

“They don’t curtsy, where you’re from?”

“Not nearly as much. Kyrria is less interested in conventions these days, unlike you restrained Bizidelans.”

“You’re from Kyrria!” Sara blushes at the sheer excitement in her voice. “What part?”

“Bast. You’ve been there?”

She shakes her head. “I’ve never left Bizidel,” she confesses.

His surprise is clear behind the mask. “Never? Really?”

“No. My brother had his year in Ayortha, but I... did not.” She’d been deemed too sickly at the time, and the queen, once decided, would not be moved.

“Do I look like a Kyrrian?” Yuri asks.

Sara has no idea. They’ve reached shouting distance of the castle and the spill of light illuminates Yuri’s red hair, pulled back in a simple small ponytail. His doublet, though plain, is made of very fine suede. His mouth settles in the natural curl of a playful smirk. They reach the side courtyard and Sara can hear the clatter of carriages and horses from where they must be pulling through the gate. It’s much later than she thought if people are already leaving.

“It’s hard to tell with the mask,” she says finally.

“You should visit. Once you’ve been there a week you could pin one by the back of their head. They have a certain arrogance about them.”

“I can see it,” Sara says. He laughs, but cuts it off before it’s fully voiced, covering his mouth.

“You’re very funny,” he says, almost as an afterthought. The castle clock chimes midnight, echoing through the courtyard. “And I’m late. Good night.”

He turns to go, but Sara catches the edge of his sleeve. “Wait! Will I see you tomorrow night?”

He looks back at her, lips pinched together; for a moment, Sara could swear that he looked afraid, but it’s wiped away quickly by that playful smile. “Isn’t that the point? To come to all three and charm you with my dancing and witticisms?”

“I didn’t see you dancing in the great hall earlier,” Sara says.

He spreads his hands in a shrug. “Your lovely gardens called,” he says simply.

“Well, then, sir—” Sara curtsies once again. Yuri is smiling when she rises. “Til tomorrow.”

Yuri bows in response, surprisingly well. “Til then, my lady.”

—-

Unsurprisingly, it isn’t until they’re coming back from their morning ride that Mickey even thinks to ask Sara about her night. She’s heard all about the Okukawa heir’s stumbling advances, the lecture from queen when she caught him and Emil laughing at the girl afterwards, the moment when the older Katsuki cornered him by the refreshments table, and on and on. Mama had once joked that she knew Mickey would be a talker from the moment he was born. “Screaming as if he was complaining about the injustice of being born,” she’d laughed. As the story went, Sara hadn’t cried a bit, not until the nurse had turned her upside down and spanked her.

Now, Mickey looks back at her as they come down out of the foothills. “What about your night, rella? Did Giacometti tread on your toes and rip your dress?”

“No, I tripped in the gardens and tore it myself.” Claudia hadn’t said a thing when she’d seen the shredded lace. She’d simply gathered it up and taken it to be laundered and mended. “I’ll have to be more careful tonight.”

“Yes, you will, if you don’t want a true tongue-lashing.”

Even Mickey quivers before their mother’s considerable hot temper, which tends to sweep in like a late-summer hurricane: without warning or consideration of the destruction it could leave behind. “I’m not wearing much of a heel tonight,” is all Sara says. “Will you dance with the Okukawa heir again?”

“Of course. She’s the only one with a title to match mine.” Mickey says it lightly, as if they haven’t both heard it a thousand times before. “Will you dance with Giacometti again?”

Sara suppresses a shudder. “I suppose.”

She doesn’t mention the mysterious Yuri. In the back of her mind, somewhere, she worries he’ll disappear if she speaks his name.

After lunch, though, she goes directly to the library. The atlas is spread over the central table as usual. She traces the familiar lines. Here, the borders of Bizidel and Kyrria and Ayortha, cut along the spine of the mountain range. There’s Dell’Ovo, south, bordered by the expanse of the Zaciras Sea. The castle is a tiny dot right off the coast, at the bay’s mouth.

She follows the main road north to the Kyrrian border, with Lostela just on the Bizidel side. That’s as far as Sara’s been from Dell’Ovo. Then, she finds the elves’ forest deep in Kyrria, sprinkled with the little pointed pine symbol. A few leagues to the west of it is Bast.

Sara touches it with a single finger. It feels as far away as the moon.

—-

The second night goes much the same as the first. All the attendants unmask directly after the first dance. Nikiforov is first in line to offer his arm and the sarabande’s stately tempo means he’s able to talk her ear off without pause.

“So?” he says as they start. “Have you found your one true love in the few short hours since last we met?”

For a moment, Sara wonders what he would do if she responded to him in earnest. If she lowered her lashes and said, bald-facedly, that he was the one. He’d probably laugh and pat her on the head. “No,” she says.

“I hear my friend Christophe gave it a go.” He indicates where Giacometti languishes against a pillar nearby. He lifts a hand in half-salute.

 _Gave it a go_. Sara shivers as Nikiforov spins her.

“Don’t worry,” he says. He pulls her back in. “He doesn’t mean any of it. If I’d taken even half of what he says seriously, I would have either married or throttled him long ago.”

“He’s very convincing,” Sara says, remembering the wink.

“We try,” Nikiforov says dryly.

The thing is, Sara has always known it was a game: the titles, the alliances, the balls, the dancing, the careful orchestrations of who talks to whom when and where. Some, like her mother, play with the utmost seriousness. Others, like Nikiforov and Giacometti, play with no mind for anything other than fun. But now that she is the prize at the center, Sara finds she has no interest in any of it.

She scans the hall—still no sign of Yuri. She sees Mickey across the room, close to the surrounded by all the most eligible young women in attendance. He laughs at something one of them say, head tilted back. No sign of any glare.

At the end of the dance, Nikiforov’s bow is even more ostentatious than usual. He’s replaced by some young lord whose name Sara spends the whole dance trying to remember. At least he doesn’t talk, until the final notes drift through the air and he bows over her hand. Then, he says, “It’s Ollo, by the way, my lady.”

Sara flushes as he leaves. Thankfully, the first break is called and she can slip away to the garden for some fresh air.

The clock tower chimes half past nine when she’s made it out of view of the castle. Only one hour gone! Sara has to gulp down the fresh air to keep the panic at bay. She redirects her feet toward the center of the garden, turning her face away when she passes anyone to avoid having to talk.

Somehow, she’s unsurprised to find Yuri at the olive tree once again. This time, he’s sitting at the foot of it, elbows on his knees, staring up into the branches. His mask is a gold brocade tonight. She steps lightly on the gravel as she approaches.

“All right,” she says when she’s closer. He startles, dramatically. “Now you really must tell me what you’re doing.”

He stands awkwardly, one hand against the trunk. “Enjoying the fresh air.”

“Liar.”

“You’ll laugh.”

“Maybe,” Sara says.

He looks away and then back before saying, “I’m looking for the egg.”

Sara does laugh. And once she starts, she can’t stop. Yuri stands there and scowls while she holds her stomach and howls with it. Finally, she tapers off enough to say, “You can’t believe that that’s true.”

Yuri steps onto the path. He crosses his arms over his chest. “Who says I believe it? I can look for it regardless.”

“What would you do if you found it?”

“I don’t know. I hadn’t thought that far.”

“You’re looking for a mythical egg that you don’t think exists, and you haven’t even thought about what you would do?”

“God! I wouldn’t have taken it and doomed your entire castle to crumble into the sea, if that’s what you’re accusing me of.”

“I’m not accusing you of anything,” Sara says, on the defensive once again. She resists the urge to turn and flee back to the castle; instead, she faces him and takes a deep breath. “This is my garden and and my ball and that’s twice now I’ve found you where you shouldn’t be, so I think I have a right to ask a few simple questions!”

Yuri is silent in the wake of the sudden tirade. Then, he grins, widely. “That must have felt good.”

Surprisingly, it did. Sara shakes her shoulders back. It’s the most words she’s said in a row in the last three days. The wind changes and she hears a few stray notes plucked from a lute, caught by the breeze. “Would you like to dance?” she finds herself saying.

Even behind the mask, Yuri looks taken aback. “Here?” he says.

“I was thinking the hall, but this is certainly passable.” The dance is a dignified pavane. Mickey’s least favorite.

Yuri clearly wavers for a moment, feet shifting on the gravel. Then he offers his arm. “Why the hell not?”

He’s a terrible dancer. He steps on her toes, keeps turning the wrong way, and generally has no sense of rhythm. Sara has to bite her lip to keep from laughing. The fourth time he turns clockwise instead of counter she can’t suppress it any longer.

“I’m not used to leading!” Yuri protests. “That is, I’m out of practice.”

“I can tell,” Sara says. “Here.” They switch sides and it goes much better, though Yuri’s sense of rhythm is still utterly hopeless. The wind stays favorable and they can hear all the following songs. Next is an allemande, then another sarabande, and then the clock is striking eleven. Sara drops Yuri’s arm. “Oh, goodness,” she says, “I should go back.”

She turns to Yuri, who has already stepped away. “You’re a terrible host,” he says, but Sara can see he’s smiling.

“That’s what my mother will say unless I show my face. But I’ve shirked too many responsibilities to be in this garden for it to be a surprise.”

“She looks very serious, the handful of times I’ve seen her.”

“She’s queen,” Sara says. “When my uncle died a few years back, well... We call it the Twin Throne for a reason. It’s not meant to be held alone.” She smoothes her skirts, suddenly embarrassed at her honesty. “Well.”

“I’ll walk you back,” Yuri says abruptly, and when Sara nods he falls in beside her on the path. He doesn’t speak until they’re nearly to the courtyard, and then he says, “Can I tell you something?”

“Of course,” Sara says. She clasps her hands, waiting.

“I got lost in that garden both last night and tonight. Searching for the egg. I’d heard all the stories, and I thought that if I had come all this way...” He shrugs. “That’s why you didn’t see me in the hall.”

“Now that I’ve seen you dance I see why that was preferable to coming into the hall.”

Yuri’s eyes are bright with laughter. “Tomorrow will be different,” he says, and it sounds like a promise.

—-

“Where _were_ you last night?”

Mickey’s voice precedes him into Sara’s bedroom; the _bang_ of the door slamming open still reverberates around the room.

“Go away, Mickey,” Sara groans, and turns over. She can see daylight peeking through around the edges of the heavy drapes, so it isn’t absurdly early. But still.

Mickey ignores her, of course, and goes straight to the window closest to her bed. He yanks the curtains open with a flourish. “You disappeared for more than an hour. You should have expected someone would notice.”

Sara doesn’t point out that she disappeared for most of the first night and no one noticed then. “I was walking in the gardens.”

“Emil saw you with someone.”

Well, there’s the end of the evasiveness. Mickey will harass the truth out of her now that he’s got a whiff of it. She tries anyway. “I’m sleeping. Leave me alone.”

“You’re not.” Mickey tears another window open. “You’re awake and you’re answering my questions.”

“I did.”

“You didn’t.”

Sara heaves herself up in bed. “You asked where I was and I said in the gardens!”

Mickey glares. “Who were you _with_?”

Sara tries to glare back but she’s never been able to muster the kind of fire Mickey does. “His name is Yuri,” she says finally.

“Who?” Mickey says blankly.

“He’s a Kyrrian lord.”

“ _I’ve_ never heard of him,” Mickey says, as if that decides Yuri’s importance then and there. “Giacometti asked me where you were.”

“I’ll never marry Giacometti, so it’s of no consequence,” Sara says brazenly. Mickey’s eyebrows go sky high and she blushes, pulling her knees up under the blankets. “What?”

He surveys her for a moment and then shakes his head, laughing. “You have a nose for trouble, _rella_.”

“Trouble how?” Sara says, but the magic of last night is already dissipating around her in the face of Mickey’s questions. He’s still laughing. She grips the blankets in both hands.

“Oh, Sara—don’t,” Mickey says quickly. He takes her hands and sits on the edge of the bed. “No panicking, not yet. You still have one more night.”

Sara takes a deep breath. Her hands are still shaking in Mickey’s grip.

“Make a show of dancing with the Nikiforovs and Giacomettis tonight. You need to be able to say that you tried your best. After all, we’re in this together. If I can enjoy myself, so can you.”

 _If only it were that easy_ , Sara thinks, but she just nods.

—-

She tries. Her posture is immaculate, her dancing is dazzling and her small talk is... Well, she tries her best. Nikiforov and Giacometti, with whom she dances two times apiece, carry the conversations easily but with other partners Sara has to exert all of her insufficient skill.

“And you have lived in Frell long?” she finds herself saying to a long-faced nobleman well into the second hour. He seems incapable of doing much more than staring at his feet except for when Sara asks him a question.

“My whole life,” he says before he resumes his examination of the floor.

The second break cannot come quickly enough, but the young Sir Lee accosts her at the refreshment table. He answers her questions with only one or two words apiece until she asks about his pack of hunting dogs, and then words stream out of him without pause.

“Soyun is without a doubt the star of the pack these days, now that Hae is out of her prime,” he says in his monotonous drone and Sara can’t stop herself from massaging her temples.

“Sir Lee,” she says finally, interrupting him mid-description of the summer’s first hunt, “could I trouble you to fetch me another glass of punch?” He inclines his head and steps away. Once he’s gone, Sara lets herself drift over to one of the window alcoves. She can feel the fresh air calling to her.

She moves closer, and then she sees him, lurking behind a pillar. Yuri.

It’s—odd to see him in the interior light, as opposed to under the moonlit sky. If it weren’t for the normal size of his feet, she would wonder if he was a fairy. He’s very pale and his hair is very red. And, when his gaze lands on her, his eyes are the blue-green of the sea on an summer day behind the mask.

He takes one step toward her but stops when Sara puts her hand up just slightly. She scans the room. Mickey is surrounded by his usual crowd of admirers, looking to be enjoying himself mightily. Envy lances through her at the sight. He was made for nights like these. But, at least he’s distracted.

Emil crouches by her mother, conversing quietly; Sir Lee has been accosted in turn by Lord Chulanont. She steps further back into the alcove and Yuri mirrors her, drawing closer and closer until he’s right there and Sara can see the very light sprinkling of freckles across his nose.

“Are you not allowed to be seen with me?” he asks in an amused undertone once she’s within earshot. “Did someone chastise you?”

“Maybe,” Sara says, then, “I’ve been wondering if you were a fairy.”

That gets her a sharp laugh from him, higher than Sara would have expected. He stifles it quickly, just as before. “And?”

“Your feet are much too large.”

He looks down and mock-examines them. “Unfortunately, you are correct. I’ve always been told I have unusually large feet.” He smiles at her and Sara returns it.

Just then, the orchestra starts up again. Sara pulls away, into the shadow of the drapes, so no one will come ask her to dance. Yuri follows suit and they watch the floor fill with couples.

“I don’t understand how you do this for fun,” Yuri says after a few stanzas of the courante. “It’s like its own form of torture.”

“The dancing itself... That’s fun,” Sara says. Mickey twirls Lady Mari Katsuki right in the middle of the crowd. “The politicking, the unspoken rules... not as much.”

“My lady?”

Sara startles, turning, and sees Viktor Nikiforov with a cup of punch in his hand and a very inquisitive expression on his face. “Oh—hello,” is all Sara can manage.

“I don’t mean to interrupt,” he says smoothly. He offers her the cup. “I relieved this from a reluctant Seung-gil Lee, but as he was caught up in a discussion on kenneling practices I thought it best to make sure you were adequately attended to.” Sara takes the cup as Nikiforov’s eyes drift past her to Yuri.

“My lord, may I present Lord Yuri of Bast,” Sara says quickly. Yuri bows and Nikiforov does as well.

“It is a pleasure,” Nikiforov intones. “Bast is my mother’s hometown. In what part is your estate?”

“I haven’t lived there for some time,” Yuri says. “I’ve been apprenticed to a knight for the better part of these last five years, and he’s been part of a detail in Fens for the whole time.”

Nikiforov’s brows have drawn together slightly but his voice is the same lethargic drawl. “I see. It’s a very far distance to travel. How did you convince your knight to let you travel all this way, just for a few balls?”

“A few balls? In honor of the future rulers of Bizidel, sir, and a cause for celebration across the whole of the Four Kingdoms. Hardly a small matter. Or so the invitation said.”

Nikiforov inclines his head. “You are correct, of course. Princess, I apologize for my rudeness.”

“No need,” Sara says. Her voice comes out in something like a squeak. She clears her throat. “No need,” she repeats, and sketches a curtsy for good measure.

“I will leave you in peace, then, if you promise to hold the next gavotte for me?”

“Of course,” Sara says, and Nikiforov bows once more before rejoining the throng.

Yuri heaves out a sigh as soon as he’s gone. “My god,” he says, but doesn’t elaborate.

Sara longs to escape to the garden. Just as the thought occurs to her, the clock chimes—half past eleven. Sara takes that as tacit approval from the universe. “Come on,” she says to Yuri, and he follows her in sneaking from shadow to shadow to the double doors that stand open onto the balcony.

Sara exhales long and loud once the clear night sky is overhead. She digs a particularly uncooperative hairpin out of her bun and discreetly throws it over the balcony railing. There are a few knots of people scattered about. Though no one so much as glances at them, she and Yuri make for the short staircase that leads to the gardens proper.

The gravel crunches underfoot. The air is so clean; it must have rained at some point in the evening. Sara can smell the fresh scent above the usual note of saltwater.

“Do you think its real?” Yuri asks without preamble.

“What?”

“The egg. The cornerstone. The heart of the castle, whichever name you want to choose.”

Sara considers. “I think it must be,” she says finally. “Though Mickey and I spent years trying to find it as children, we never did. I know this castle inside and out because of it. And they really do say the castle should fall straight into the ocean as its built. The architects don’t know why it doesn’t.”

“Hm,” is all Yuri says. Then, “A fairy-built castle is a good thing for a kingdom to have, I suppose.”

Sara laughs. “I can pin a foreigner from their obsession with it, certainly. That, and our fireworks.”

For some reason, that makes Yuri fall silent. They walk quietly for several minutes before he speaks again. “Will you be glad when the balls have ended?”

“Yes. No. I’m not sure.” Sara struggles for words. “It will be odd to return to normal life.”

“What will your mother say if you are still not betrothed by the end of tonight?”

Sara cuts her eyes over at him, but he’s looking out beyond the rose bushes to the dark velvet of the ocean. “I don’t know,” she says. “Mama has joked about sending me away.” Once, when she was very angry about the result of their Ayorthian diplomat’s most recent trade negotiations. “Nothing, probably. I might leave myself, however.”

“Leave Bizidel?”

Sara feels his own surprise within herself. She doesn’t know what has made her finally voice the wish she’s carried for so long. “I never have. I think I should at some point. You traveled further than I’ve ever been in my life to come here.”

The clock chimes midnight behind them. As it echoes through the grounds, it’s followed closely by the murmur of a crowd streaming out onto the balcony. _The fireworks_ , Sara remembers. The little fleet of _cochas_ is launching itself from the harbor at the southern foot of the castle.

“What’s happening?” Yuri asks her.

“Fireworks, to formally end the celebrations,” Sara says. There’s one other vessel out in the bay; she can see it in the torchlight from the approaching fleet. It’s just a small fishing boat, bobbing in the gentle waves, about to have the awakening of its life.

“I think perhaps I should—” Yuri starts to say, but he’s interrupted by someone calling Sara’s name.

They turn; a small group of partygoers approach, led by Count Nikiforov himself. They’re flanked by torch-bearing servants. “My lady!” he’s saying. “Is this the best viewpoint on the island? We are determined to see your Bizidel fireworks in all their splendor.”

“It certainly is,” comes Mickey’s voice as he looms up from behind Nikiforov. “ _Rella_ , don’t you think?” He has a glass of champagne in hand and the Okukawa heir on his arm. His voice feels as if it’s reverberating through the garden and straight into Sara’s skull. He sees Yuri, who is doing his best to blend into the shadowed hedge. “Who’s this, then?”

“Lord Yuri of Bast,” Sara says. Yuri takes a step forward, bowing, and Mickey frowns at the sight of him.

“The young nobleman who kept my sister from her guests for an entire evening. I’m not certain of the customs in Kyrria,” he says, louder still, “but in the presence of a sovereign, it is considered respectful to unmask.”

“It’s quite all right,” Sara says, but Mickey ignores her. Giacometti appears over his other shoulder.

“Bast, did you say? Vitya, isn’t your mother from Bast?”

“She is,” Nikiforov says easily. “More champagne, milord?” Mickey accepts the glass from a servant, still glaring at Yuri.

“I should go,” Yuri says in her ear. In the flickering torchlight, his entire face looks like a mask.

“Wait, will I—”

She’s interrupted by Mickey again. “What’s your father’s name, then?”

“Mickey,” Sara snaps. He ignores her again, so she stands directly in his line of sight. “ _Michele_.” He looks at her, finally. “Lord Yuri is going.”

“An honor to meet you,” Yuri says, and jerks another bow as he passes. Giacometti steps into his pathway.

“It’s all in good fun, you understand,” Giacometti says. He offers his hand to Yuri. “All part of the game.”

Yuri looks at it for a second. “Of course,” he says, and takes Giacometti’s hand.

Without a moment of hesitation, Giacometti yanks Yuri in roughly and snatches the mask off Yuri’s face with his other hand.

Yuri pulls away instantly, shielding his face. The little group is laughing raucously, the Okukawa heir clutching Mickey’s arm as she shrieks with it. One of the gentlemen jostles Giacometti’s shoulder in mock rebuke. Nikiforov is staring at Yuri, who’s backed away.

“Mila?” he says. Then, louder, “ _Mila_?”

Yuri runs.

Sara runs after him without a second thought. She hikes her skirts up with both hands and follows him through the garden to the western end. From the sound of it, Nikiforov is running after them as well. The laughter of the little group filters after them through the grove.

A huge _boom_ explodes directly above, and Sara is startled enough by it that she trips and goes sprawling on her back, glimpsing the great green and red firework spraying out across the sky. Nikiforov swears somewhere behind her. She picks herself up and runs on. The trees clear, the ocean spreading out before her beyond the shoulder-high sea wall, and she finally can see Yuri—Mila? Was that what Nikiforov called him?—standing atop it.

“Wait!” she yells, and skids to a stop.

He turns towards her and Sara realizes, with a shock that feels like ice, that he is a _girl_. A woman, in fact, short red hair blowing around her face, loosened by the mask’s removal. She looks to be around Sara’s age, or maybe a bit younger. The absence of a mask reveals high cheekbones, a small nose, with those blue-green eyes above and smirking lips below.

He—she is waiting, Sara realizes, all traces of playfulness gone from her expression. She looks over her shoulder out to the harbor, at the fireworks going off over their heads, and then back at Sara.

“Who are you?” Sara calls out.

“I told you. I’m no one.” Now that Sara can see her face, the voice makes sense. _Not a countertenor. Not a countertenor at all._

“How does Nikiforov know you?”

“I’m sure he’ll tell you presently,” the woman says. She turns away and runs along the sea wall, towards where it juts out over the waves.

“Stop!” Sara shouts, dashing after her. The woman halts one more time, toes lined up at the edge of the wall like a diver. A silver dragon—Mickey’s favorite—bursts into being just behind her. Sara pauses, trying to catch her breath. The shock is dissipating, and in its place humiliation is blooming like a miasma.

“Why did you do it?” Sara says finally.

The woman looks away, out at the harbor, and then back at Sara. “For fun,” she says. “It was a dare.” She glances over her shoulder again before sparing one final glance for Sara. “I’m sorry,” she says, and then she’s gone.

For a second, Sara thinks she’s fallen and she scrambles for the wall, using the natural footholds in the stone to climb atop. Then, in the water meters below, she sees her—Mila—swimming out into the bay. The fishing boat that Sara noticed earlier has come around the castle and is stroking towards her rapidly. The boat’s only occupant pulls her in once she reaches it, and then each of them grasp an oar.

Sara watches the little boat bob towards the shore, fireworks throwing it into stark relief every few moments, until it disappears into the night sky.

—-

Nikiforov doesn’t find her for almost another ten minutes; he’s huffing and puffing when he does. “Your gardens are a maze!” he gasps. He looks around wildly. “Where is she? I’m going to have her whipped within an inch of her life.”

“She’s gone,” Sara says. She thinks she might be sick. The sky spins above her and Nikiforov rushed to help her down from the wall.

“Not a good place to faint, my lady,” he says, easing her down to sit on the damp ground.

“Who is she?” Sara gasps. Nikiforov grimaces but doesn’t answer. Sara clutches his arm. “Who is she? Tell me.”

“A servant in my household,” Nikiforov says quietly.

 _A servant. A servant, a servant, a servant_. It’s all too much. The world twirls once more and then goes black.

—-

When she wakes, she’s in her own bed. The curtains, all open, stream the dense light of the early morning into the room. It takes a moment for memory to catch up, but when it does, it slams into her with hurricane force.

Mickey has no doubt told Mama everything. That is, if Nikiforov told _him_. Had Mickey seen anything? Sara herself hadn’t realized until she’d seen Mila standing on the wall.

The humiliation from the previous night rises up her throat. What had Mila said? _For fun. It was a dare._

It had been a game all along.

The shame turns to panic in her veins and Sara is suddenly desperate to be out from under the heavy blankets. She pushes herself up to sitting just as the door opens. Claudia slips through, tea tray in hand. “My lady, you’re awake! How do you feel?”

Sara passes a hand over her brow. “I’m well.”

“The headache is gone?”

“The headache?”

Claudia pours her a steaming cup of the mint tea. “That’s what the Count said—you were overcome with one upon the start of the fireworks.” Claudia doesn’t say what she and Sara both know—Sara has never had a headache triggered by fireworks before. “The Prince didn’t seem to believe him, but when I saw that you were unharmed otherwise, he bade Emil carry you up here. Drink.”

Sara does so, grasping for understanding. “Count Nikiforov?”

“The very same. I’ve laid out your dressing gown, but take your time. No rush to rise on a morning like this.”

Sara is out of the bed the moment Claudia closes the door behind her.

—-

Only the servants are up this early; the sun is barely above the horizon out her widows. The page at her outer door gawks at the sight of Sara in her dressing gown, but he schools his features quickly.

“Emil,” Sara says to him. “Where is he?”

“Stables, I believe, milady.”

He is indeed, brushing Mickey’s chestnut stallion. He startles when Sara charges in. “My lady! What are you doing here?”

“I need you to tell me what happened last night, Emil,” Sara says in a low voice, even though the stables are empty save for the horses. Comprehension floods his features instantly. He sets the brush aside.

“Count Nikiforov came up from the gardens carrying you,” he tells her in a similarly low tone. “Mickey on his heels. The count said you’d fainted at the first firework, that you had a headache. Claudia looked you over and Mickey had me carry you up to your rooms.”

“That’s all?”

“That’s all. Except—” Emil looks discomfited. “When he left, the count told me you might have some questions when you woke and that he’d be at your disposal this morning, should you wish to come by.” He raises his eyebrows at her.

“Oh, it’s nothing like that, Emil, please,” Sara says. She smacks his shoulder. “You know me better than that.”

“Indeed,” Emil says, looking immensely relieved.

“Can you ask Bino to ready my horse? Please? I’m heading to the Nikiforov estate straightaway.”

—-

Mickey is in her room.

She goes directly to the wardrobe without waiting to hear what he has to say. He’s sitting on the chaise, still in his undershirt from last night.

“ _Rella_ ,” he says. His tone is beseeching. “Tell me what happened.”

“No,” Sara says. She pulls out her padded pants and vest; there’s no reason to bother with a riding dress for a visit like this, though she knows Mama would say otherwise.

“I’m sorry, all right? It’s...” He exhales, loudly. “It’s been a demanding few days.”

“Try few years,” Sara says coolly. She takes the clothes behind the screen to change. Mickey keeps talking.

“I still don’t know who he is. Nikiforov didn’t tell me. He refused. No one else saw.”

“Regardless of the results,” Sara says, “your behavior was inexcusable.” She tucks the shirt in and fastens a belt around her waist.

“I was _protecting_ you,” Mickey says, more stringently. When she comes out from behind the screen, he’s standing. “You’re too warm-hearted. Too many people in this world will use that against you.”

Sara twists her hair up into a bun. “And yet, you are the person who so often has used it against me, Mickey,” she says.

All the fight seems to go out of him in that instant. He sags back down onto the chair. He watches her tie a scarf around her hair and lace up her riding boots. “Where are you going?” he says finally.

“To see her,” Sara says, throwing caution to the wind. She’s tired of all of it, and the shock that washes across Mickey’s face as she speaks feels like twenty years of vindication. “Mila. That’s who it was this whole time. A girl named Mila. A servant in Nikiforov’s household.”

Mickey gapes at her. “A _servant_?”

“Yes. And if you breathe a word of this to Mama, I will never speak to you again. I will never forgive you.”

Mickey shakes his head. “I can’t believe this is happening. To you, of all people.”

“Believe it,” she says, and leaves.

—-

Sara doesn’t think about it until she’s standing on the Nikiforov doorstep, the sun still barely over the horizon, kerchief slipping into her eyes from the ride. She pushes it up impatiently and sees that her hands are shaking. _Not now, not now_ , she prays and wills them to stillness.

Instead of a servant, a young man in a simple dressing gown opens the door. His dark hair is swept back, and his serious, long-lashed eyes asses Sara before pulling the door all the way open.

“Your highness,” he says. “Viktor told me you might come by.”

It’s a very casual welcome for one of the wealthiest estates within Bizidel’s borders. Every other time she’s come—accompanied by either Mickey or her mother—it has been appropriately formal, but this morning no one else seems to be around. The man leads Sara down the hall to a sitting room. It’s opulently decorated in cool grays and blues. He gestures for Sara to sit, and once she does he slips back out.

The room is silent except for the _tick... tick... tick..._ of the mantel clock. Sara knits her hands together and focuses on not thinking too much. Before long, the man reappears with a tea tray in hand and Nikiforov behind. His robe is as luxurious as the room.

“Princess,” he says, coming forward at once. “I owe you an immediate and heartfelt apology.” He speaks quickly, without any of his usual languor. “I had no idea that such a scheme was happening within my own home. I promise you I will resolve it with swiftness and severity, and it will never be spoken of again.”

“Vitya,” the other man says from the sideboard, where he’s pouring the tea. “Let the princess speak.” He presents her with a cup; Sara takes it. Viktor sits back and waits.

“Where is she?” Sara says.

“She’s packing. I’m sending her back to Bast. Her mother was my mother’s lady’s maid. When her mother died five years back, I gave her a position here. My cousin and she are like siblings—I’m sure he’s involved with this somehow. His behavior has never befitted someone of his station. I’ll deal with him as well.”

Sara sets the cup aside, undrunk. “I’d like to see her.”

“Is that wise?” Viktor says, but at another quelling glance from the other man, he hastily says, “Of course, of course.” The two of them leave again and Sara is left once more to the silent room.

She can’t stay seated any more. She gets up and paces. The heavy carpet absorbs the footsteps. Through one of the open windows, she can see the yard. A golden-haired boy chases after a chicken and lugs it back towards the house.

Behind her, the door opens. Sara turns.

It’s Mila. She shuts the door softly and takes a couple steps into the room. At the sight of her, the humiliation blooms once again from the center of Sara’s chest. _So foolish. So gullible. So easily taken in._ Every criticism she’s ever heard from her mother, from Mickey floats to the top of her mind.

She has enough shreds of her pride left, however, to ignore them. She opens her mouth—and the door bursts open once again. “Mila!” the boy shouts—the golden-haired one from the yard, hands still grubby from the dirt. ”Where is—oh!” His face blanks out at the sight of Sara, who he obviously recognizes. “Oh—oh, oh my god, Mila, is this what I—”

“Not now, Yuri,” Mila snarls. She shoves him backwards by the shoulder and slams the door in his face. Sara can hear him cackling behind the door. “Sorry,” Mila mutters. Her face is a mixture of aggravation and embarrassment. She’s wearing a ragged cotton dress, hair tucked behind her ears.

“So there is a Yuri?” Sara asks.

“Yes. That’s him. It was the first name I thought of when I introduced myself. The count’s cousin. Foolish, in retrospect.” She falls quiet. Somewhere in the stable a horse neighs. In the daylight, Mila’s eyes are much more blue than green. “Why did you come?” Mila says finally.

“I—” Words dissolve in her mouth. “I wanted to know,” she tries, “if it was real.”

“What was real?”

“Any of it,” Sara says lamely. “Or was all of it a game?”

Mila meets her gaze, lips thinned to a line. “At first,” she says, “it was a game. Yuri dared me to go. He dared me to look for the egg.”

“I see,” Sara says faintly.

“It was only supposed to be for a night,” Mila says. “And then...” Her eyes sweep over Sara, once.

“And then?” Every nerve in her body thrums, trying to anticipate the answer. The tick of the clock thunders in her ears.

And then... nothing,” Mila says finally. She stands up straighter, hands clasped in front of her, and Sara can see a glimpse of that bravado-filled boy from the castle gardens. “It was very foolish and I deserve much worse than being sent home.”

“I see,” Sara says again. They’re both silent. “Well,” Sara says eventually.

“If that’s all, your highness?” Mila bobs a servant’s curtsy, shoulders caving in, and the bravado is gone again.

“It is,” Sara says, and with that Mila slips out the door.

She must sit, because the young man who opened the door is sitting beside her sometime later and taking her hands in his. They sit like that silently for a few minutes, and then he says, “Your highness, please allow me to drive you home.”

—-

It takes more than an hour by carriage than by horse. Also, without the need to guide her horse, Sara is left to her own thoughts.

That’s it, then. No fairytale ending, no declarations in the Nikiforov parlor. Just a lonely, foolish princess returning to her small, dull life.

They trundle over the drawbridge when the sun is high in the sky. The water is flat today, filled with fishing vessels. They come to a stop in the courtyard and the young man throws the reins to Bino so he can come around and help her down from the carriage. Sara grasps his hand as he’s about to let go. “Please—what’s your name?”

“Yuuri Katsuki, your highness,” he says. “And if I may say so without presuming too much—life is long and the world is large.” He lets go and hops back into the carriage in one smooth motion. Sara stares after him long after he’s disappeared from view.

—-

Four weeks later, Mickey reappears in her doorway.

“Go away,” Sara says automatically, the way she has every other time.

“No,” he says, which is new. He’d been appropriately recalcitrant since the events of the ball, but Sara should have expected it would only last so long. She’d managed to be in the same room as him only for the formal announcement of his engagement to the Okukawa heir last week. “You’re pining.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Sara says. She burrows deeper into her blankets. She has no idea what time it is and she doesn’t care. Mickey throws open the curtains all the same. “Get out,” she snaps.

“No,” he says again. He turns to her, fists on hips. “I’ll not allow this to happen.”

“It’s not yours to _allow_ ,” Sara says.

“If you give up now, Sara Crispino, you’re a bigger coward than I ever thought possible.”

That gets Sara’s attention. She sits up. “Coward? I’m the coward?”

“You’re certainly acting like one.”

“Get _out_ ,” Sara shouts. She grabs a pillow and hurls it at him. He dodges easily.

“You can hate me,” Mickey says. “You can hate Mama, you can renounce your duties as a princess, but I will not allow you to throw your life away.”

“Get! Out!” she shrieks. He dodges every pillow she throws.

“You love her,” Mickey says. He steps in and snatches the last pillow from her grasp.

“How _dare_ you,” Sara hisses. She grabs for the pillow but he holds it out of reach.

“You found someone and you gave up at the first sign of trouble. That makes you a coward. A cowardly Crispino.”

The pillow is a lost cause. Sara throws herself back into bed. “I don’t want to hear anything you’ve got to say,” she says. She presses her forearm over her eyes so the tears don’t fall again.

“Too bad. If you really, actually cared, you would take your horse and you would ride until you got to Bast and then you would tell that girl how you feel.”

Sara peeks out from under her arm. “How do you know she’s in Bast?”

“Nikiforov finally told me. I’ve been after him for weeks. He’s worried about you, too.”

He’d come to the castle to visit her multiple times but Sara had never gone down to see him. She’d happened upon Yuuri riding in the foothills a few times; he’d fallen in beside her until their paths diverged, and then he would silently slip away.

“She doesn’t care about me,” Sara says finally.

“She said that?”

Sara trawls through her hazy memory of that morning. “No,” she says finally.

“Then how do you know?”

“She left. She said it was nothing.”

“Did you ask her if she loved you?”

“No,” Sara says.

“Well, then.” Mickey looks triumphant, as if he’s just solved all her problems.

“I’ll write her,” Sara says, but it’s half-hearted and Mickey knows it.

“You need to get out of Dell’Ovo regardless,” he says, more quietly. “And...”

Sara sits up.

“Nikiforov just told me he’s making a trip to Kyrria. He’s leaving at the end of the week. He plans to be in Frell by Samhain, and Bast is just a week’s ride from there.”

The beginnings of hope flare to life in Sara’s chest. There’s a flicker of motion: Mickey is rifling through her dressing table. He comes back to her bedside and holds something out to her. Her riding gloves.

“Go win her,” he says.

* * *

EPILOGUE

* * *

The inn is crowded, noisy, and smoky. Three of Sara’s least favorite things. Still, she shoulders her way through the crowd like she was born doing it. Which, after the last two months, she might as well have been.

The bartender doesn’t take much notice of her—a single woman in ratty traveling gear and shorn hair—but then Sara flashes a gold KJ and a mug of ale appears with alacrity.

Sara takes a drink and scans the crowd. It looks mostly to be locals, but there are a few grizzled wanderers like herself scattered throughout the mix. Two gnomes, better dressed than the rest of the crowd put together, talk over a ledger in the corner nearest Sara.

The ale is better than she’s gotten used to—barely watered down. “A room for the night?” the barkeep calls over the din. “Something to eat?”

“Let’s start with dinner,” Sara calls back, and the man nods and disappears. Sara lets herself enjoy the rest of the mug. She only has to feel for her knife once, when a tall fellow across the room stands, eyeing her. He tracks the motion to her hip, shrugs, and sits back down.

She hears the kitchen door swing open behind her, and turns to see Mila enter.

She has a plate of stew in each hand, and she hands one to the gnomes before looking around. Her eyes land on Sara. She takes one step forward before her face goes slack with recognition. She drops the plate. It shatters in the rushes and silence reverberates throughout the inn in its wake.

“What—” Mila gasps into the hush.

“Hello,” Sara says. She’s imagined dozens of possible greetings for this moment, imagined it a hundred different ways—but, now that she’s here, this one seems most appropriate. “I’m Sara.”

Emotions chase each other across Mila’s face: astonishment, fear, despair, yearning, in rapid succession, all wiped out by quick comprehension. She wipes her hands on her grubby apron.

“I’m Mila,” she says. Her lips curl up into that smile. “I’m so sorry about your dinner. I’ll just go grab you another plate.”

She turns back to the kitchen as the inn returns to life now that a scene doesn’t seem to be forthcoming. Mila sneaks one more glance over her shoulder before pushing through the swinging doors. Panic grips Sara when she disappears from view, but she breathes steadily and lets the feeling wash over her.

Sure enough, Mila reappears soon, this time with two plates. She sets one in front of Sara and takes the barstool next to her.

“So,” she says.

“So,” Sara repeats. She feels a smile stealing across her face like sun on the Zaciras after a midday storm, like a lily opening its mouth to the clear sky. It’s mirrored on Mila’s face. “So,” Sara says again.

Mila has dimples when she smiles widely, as she’s doing now. “So,” she says once more, and laughs.

* * *

THE END

* * *

**Author's Note:**

> There is an actual castle off the coast of Naples, Italy called [Castel dell'Ovo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castel_dell%27Ovo). As the legend goes, "Virgil himself put a magical egg into the foundations to support the fortifications. Had this egg been broken, the castle would have been destroyed and a series of disastrous events for Naples would have followed." I read that Wikipedia article early on when drafting this fic, and it ended up being the jumping-off point.


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